A Few Generic Questions?

[noidis]

Alright so I have a few simple questions, and then a few more difficult ones (At least I think they are.)

So here goes,

#1) I have all of my case fans connected to a fan controller on my rig, I so far have refrained from setting them to auto, and instead put them at 100% when I have the PC on.

My question is this though, my old case (Antec 300) seemed to make a LOT of noise and I never had it hooked up to a fan controller just to the power. However my new case (Antec DF-85) Seems relatively silent while the fans are reportedly all at 100%... Is this normal? Is it just that the new fans are quieter? I have bought 2 LED fans and installed them but the rest are the ones that came with the case.

And beyond that, what should I run the fans at? Will 100% hurt or help? What's the average? Should I play it by ear? Will the auto settings on my fan controller be the best if I actually place the temp sensors somewhere other then just having them randomly spread around my case? (I wanted them out of sight.)



#2) I'm currently running 2 GTX 560 TI's SOC in SLI, and while they seem to be great for near every game... I feel like the performance could be better in BF3. I run everything in ultra, and get occasional stuttering... Do I need to upgrade my cards? (I have the money + another PC in my home that could use these cards) Or will my cards be sufficient?

I'd really like a theoretical % improvement if someone could ballpark one for me... So I can figure out if the upgrade is worth it.


#3) I always seem to read conflicting views about graphic cards. While I've always been an Nvidia user... Are ATI cards better? Cheaper? And is it better to use my cards in SLI or to just fork up the money for a single card and upgrade to two later on? (Thinking of the 580 or 570) Which would be better? Would a 580 run better than both of my cards now?


#4) Lastly, I have around 240 GB's worth of space on SSD's, and 2 TB's in regular HD space... While I found my eyes were wayyyy bigger than my stomach while I was purchasing drives and adding them to my system, I find now that I am left with a ton of space I do almost nothing with... Should I be looking into some sort of raid configuration, or is it in terms of speed increase to go that route?




Sorry for so many questions, but didn't feel each needed it's own entry!


Thanks for any input people =D

-Noid

 

[Proximon]

Fans degrade over time, especially cheap ones. They may start out quiet and end up noisy. Fans vary greatly in many regards, noise being one. They can range in max speed from 800RPM up to 2000 or so. The type of fins can and will influence air flow and noise and other more esoteric factors.
The type of bearings influence longevity and noise.

BF3 is probably the most demanding title out there now and will be for some time. I do not recommend throwing large amounts of money at a single game. Make a few adjustments to your settings and call it good. There will be better opportunities to upgrade in 6 months.

Your third question is a good way to get this thread locked. AMD and Nvidia cards are both good, and each has its own strengths and weaknesses. TH has a monthly guide to GPUs that you can find on the front page, and that's all you need to know.


You need matching drives for raid. Take a HDD out of your system, put it in an NAS or USB enclosure, and use it as a back-up device.

 

[noidis]

Best answer selected by Noidis.

 

[noidis]

Thanks =)